Cosatu boss Zingiswa Losi becomes latest ANC leader to sow doubt over Covid vaccine

Cosatu president Zingiswa Losi has become the latest high-ranking leader of the ANC and its alliance partners to sow doubt over Covid-19 vaccines.

Losi, addressing the ANC Women’s League Charlotte Maxeke intergenerational dialogue on Thursday, questioned what vaccines the country was “looking at”.

“Because some of the vaccines are not organic, some of the vaccines leave side-effects. But as African people we have our indigenous herbs. We are not putting forward these issues as African women, to liberate SA and the African continent,” said Losi.

Losi, aside from being Cosatu president, is a member of the ANC national executive committee, the party’s highest decision-making body between conferences.

Her comments come on the same day Gauteng secretary Jacob Khawe was quoted by EWN also questioning Covid-19 vaccines.

In a video being widely shared, Khawe can be heard questioning vaccines not developed in Africa.

“And we should not enter a global space of a debate about a vaccine. We must stand together as Africans and say there is no vaccine that is going to be tested on us if it has not been tested on its people,” said Khawe.

He was apparently speaking at the funeral of ANC Tshwane councillor Daniel Mojela who died from Covid-19.

Losi did not expand on her comments over organic vaccines or the side-effects she referred to.

Her comments come in the wake of SA experiencing its deadliest day of Covid-19 on Wednesday, when it registered 844 deaths and 21,832 new cases. The health department said the spike in deaths was due to the reconciliation of historic deaths in the Eastern Cape.

Losi’s comments also come amid uproar after an ANC councillor in eThekwini, Sifiso Mngadi, sent a voice note denying the existence of Covid-19 and blaming 5G towers for the spread of the virus.

“Maybe we as councillors need to call a special council meeting, take a decision that all 5G towers must be disconnected in eThekwini,” he said.

“White people were vaccinated about five months ago. There was a truck that distributed the vaccine in boxes and white people from all over the province, including places like Ixopo and Vryheid, went there to receive these boxes. It was given to white people only.”

By Aphiwe Deklerk – TimesLIVE